Foreign Relations: Talks About Talks

Three weeks after President Johnson announced that the Soviet Union had agreed to discuss limiting nuclear arms, U.S. Ambassador Llewellyn Thompson called on Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko in Moscow for the first round of talks. Though Thompson and Gromyko conferred for only half an hour last week—and even then only on how the negotiations should be conducted— the importance of the session transcended the time spent.

The Russians have already deployed a limited anti-ballistic-missile (ABM) system around Moscow, and are thought to be extending it to other cities as well. If the U.S. followed their example, it would set off a new and immensely expensive round of the arms race (TIME ESSAY, Feb. 24) without, as Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara has noted, adding one whit to the security of either side. Thompson's task is to convince the Russians, who have an almost paranoiac regard for defense, that they have nothing to gain—and billions to lose—by attempting to upset the balance with an ABM fence.